The Willie Mullins-trained True Self (IRE) created a little bit of history when she became the first stakes-winner on the flat for the legendry National Hunt stallion Oscar but it came well before her dominant performance under Ryan Moore in Saturday’s $300,000 Group III Queen Elizabeth Stakes (2600m) at Flemington.
After winning a maiden on the flat at Cork in October last year, True Self (IRE) reeled off impressive wins in the Listed Beckford Stakes at Bath and the Listed James Seymour Stakes at Newmarket before making it thee stakes win in succession at her first start of 2019 in the Vintage Tipple Stakes at Gowran Park.
Part leased by OTI Racing for her Australian campaign, True Self (IRE) was given a patient ride by Ryan Moore and when the gap came she cleared away to defeat Carif (So You Think) by one and a half lengths with Maurus (IRE) (Medicean) a half-length away third.
The seven-year-old mare went down narrowly to the eventual Melbourne Cup runner-up Prince Of Arran in the Geelong Cup, which cost her a spot in the big two-miler but gained her a $200,000 bonus for winning the Queen Elizabeth.
Celebrating his first winner in Australia, Mullins said that is all water under the bridge now.
“We were probably a bit unlucky in the Geelong Cup if she had won that she would have easily got in (the Melbourne Cup) but we’re happy we have a winner,” Mullins said.
“She is improving, it’s extraordinary she’s seven years of age but she was jumping. My son and Paul Byrne bought her out of a bumper in England. They bought her to go jumping, and when she arrived home in the yard I took one look at her and said I hope you don’t own that. And there you are, she was brought down here, and we’ve had a winner, it’s extraordinary.
“We never dreamt she would be a flat mare; I don’t think anyone did at the time. I think she won a two-and-a-half-mile hurdle at Punchestown, which takes some getting. I’m not worried about her stamina but all the flat jockeys who ride her say she has a lot of speed. Ryan said he thinks she should come back in trip and I’m thinking I want to come back for the Melbourne Cup next year.
“We’ll have another chat at another time. Getting her home here now, hopefully, she comes out of the race sound and well. Someone said we might get an invite to Hong Kong, which would be great and then we can plan for next year.”
Oscar’s first stakes winner on the flat came three years after he was pensioned at the age of 21 at Coolmore's’ Grange Stud where he began in 1998. It came following an abbreviated career on the track where the highlight for the son of Sadler’s Wells came when second to the former Coolmore shuttler Peintre Celebre in the 1997 Prix du Jockey Club (French Derby) at his final start.
True Self (IRE) is one of three winners from seven to race out of the unraced Good Thought a daughter of another former shuttler in Mukaddamah.
